


find and seek

by crossroadswrite



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Canon Divergence, M/M, NHK Trophy, POV Victor Nikiforov, Pre-Canon Canon Divergence, a lil introspective, i suppose????, meet cute, pre-sochi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-25
Updated: 2018-04-25
Packaged: 2019-04-27 20:01:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,204
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14433030
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crossroadswrite/pseuds/crossroadswrite
Summary: Katsuki Yuuri jerks when Victor pulls the table cloth up and slams his head on the table, sending everything on top of it rattling for a second. Katsuki Yuuri who is very, very pretty with his hair pushed back and his brown eyes that stare up at Victor behind frames that are slipping down his nose. Katsuki Yuuri who is currently on his knees, more or less in between Victor’s legs, and directly at crotch level.“I can explain!” Yuuri says.(Or: in which they meet at the NHK Trophy before Sochi, Yuuri loses the triplets and Victor finds something better than gold medals to chase after.)





	find and seek

**Author's Note:**

> Shoutout to Minna, for always being the Best and betaing my Things <3
> 
> hey, y'all,,,,,,,,, ya girl is in such a hecking slump i forgot how to write idk what this is but i'm tryin real hard to write good, so here's a whole thing. i deadass just wrote this entire thing for the "they come in different colours" joke. like that's it. that's the point of this entire thing

The thing about Katsuki Yuuri, Victor has come to realize in the last six hours or so, is that he’s sneakily breathtaking. It’s like he’s not quite human, as if the gods had spun him out of the ether and put him on earth as a trap for humans. Or maybe as a blessing, Victor hasn’t quite decided yet.

You see him skating, music in motion, each spin and arc of his arms shaping the air around him and giving it life, and you think “he makes music with his body” and it makes you want to know more. So you look up his name on the Internet. That’s your first mistake.

Your second mistake is finding Phichit Chulanont’s social media because then,  _ then _ you get a front row seat to Katsuki Yuuri in his natural habitat, relaxed and smiling and  _ winking _ in silly selfies in a way you don’t get to see him be anywhere else.

Victor found a fourty second video of him cramming eight chicken nuggets in his mouth. It’s awful. He’s watched it sixteen times.

Katsuki Yuuri is like the world’s most perfect trap. One second you’re passing him by, giving him a cursory glance and thinking  _ cute _ , and the next, you’re scrolling down fanblogs and watching video compilations and have fallen into an Instagram and Twitter rabbit hole at an official ISU event instead of paying attention to sponsors and officials.

The gods are testing him. They’re testing his gay resolve.

Yuuri wasn’t even suppose to  _ be _ at the NHK Trophy this year, but apparently the JSF wanted him to be part of an exhibition event since they have so few internationally ranked skaters to start with they want to have a show of power.

It’s almost unfair, having someone so beautiful and arresting put before you on a silver platter like this and knowing that the most you could get would be a stolen night in a hotel room, because there’s never more. Victor has put his career above men and above relationships since he first stepped on the ice. There’s no room for it. Victor never bothered making room for it, not when there were medals to be won and records to be broken and points to be proven. Not when there was always a next goal, a next competition, something higher and better and shinier to reach for.

But Victor has been winning for four years, and for the last two, doing it has been almost easy. He sits in the banquet with a gold medal so heavy in his pocket it feels like a chain rooting him in place, keeping him still, static, unmoving. He sits there trying to steal a moment for himself before Yakov comes yell at him to go greet sponsors, and he clutches his phone and watches this man shove eight chicken nuggets in his mouth, and wink playfully at the camera, and be so serious and determined and he watches him skate across the ice like a dream and for a couple of seconds, he feels his heart a little lighter.

He’s been sneaking glances at Yuuri the whole night, trying to decide if he should approach, but Yuuri has seem preoccupied, always talking to someone, accompanied by a beautiful woman on his arm. Yuuri also disappeared ten minutes ago and Victor is trying not to feel too put out about it. There’ll be other banquets, other competitions where they’ll meet. And meanwhile he has videos of Yuuri shoving twelve marshmallows into his mouth and trying to talk around them.

There are an inordinate amount of videos on the internet of Yuuri shoving things in his mouth in large quantities. As a gay, Victor is a big fan of that.

He’s just about to click on a video that promises Yuuri and puppies – a deadly combination, he’s sure – when the empty chair opposite to him in the long table he’s been sat at, screeches back and almost topples over, a little girl crawling from under the table and running away. Victor startles so badly he knocks his knee against the table and drops his phone on the ground.

He hisses, having hit his knee at a funny angle that shoots pain down his leg, and takes a moment to rub the pain off before reaching down to pick up his phone. Victor scoots his chair back a little and promptly screams when a hand shoots from under the table and offers his phone up to him.

Everyone around him turns with reproving looks and Victor almost flinches, managing a charming smile at the last minute and waving his hand in the universal “everything is fine” movement, pretending there isn’t a demon under his table that is coming for his soul.

Victor gingerly takes his phone back and scoots his chair back a little bit more, lifting up the table cloth to see who is under his table and oh-  _ oh, alright _ .

Katsuki Yuuri jerks when Victor pulls the table cloth up and slams his head on the table, sending everything on top of it rattling for a second. Katsuki Yuuri who is very, very pretty with his hair pushed back and his brown eyes that stare up at Victor behind frames that are slipping down his nose. Katsuki Yuuri who is currently on his knees, more or less in between Victor’s legs, and directly at crotch level.

_ The gods are testing him _ .

“I can explain!” Yuuri says, face a very interesting shade of red as he rubs the back of his head which he just slammed against the table. That must’ve hurt.

“Is your head okay?” Victor asks

“I’m not a per- what?”

“Your head,” Victor says, gesturing vaguely towards it. “That looks like it hurt.”

“I-it’s fine?” Yuuri frowns when he’s confused, and gets this wrinkle between his eyebrows and this crease in his forehead. It’s very cute.

There’s a voice inside his head that sounds suspiciously like Chris gently mocking him that of  _ all the things _ he could’ve said when he has a cute boy on his knees in front of him the one he goes for is  _ is your head okay _ . It is a very well-kept secret that Victor is an absolute mess around pretty boys.

“A-aren’t you wondering why I’m here?” Yuuri asks, sounding like he’s regretting saying each of those words in that order but looking like he can’t stop himself and has just accepted his fate.

“Sure,” Victor says, smiles a little in that way he’s been practicing since he was thirteen and that he perfected at fifteen. “Usually, I ask for dinner first before I let people in between my legs but I can make an exception.” He winks, for added effect. There. That’s better.

Yuuri screeches and slams so hard up against the table a glass falls over.

Hm, maybe that was a bit much.

“But what brings you to my table, Yuuri?”

Yuuri blinks at him looking shell-shocked and like he might start screaming again. “You know my name?”

“Why wouldn’t I?” Victor says with an easy smile. “You  _ are _ an international ranked athlete. Japan’s Ace, yes?”

“R-right. Of course,” Yuuri says, and then just sits there and stares at Victor in a way that it makes him feel like Yuuri’s trying to break him open to poke at his messy insides.

Victor is used to being stared at, but he can feel his smile get a little strained under it.

“So?”

Yuuri blinks and seems to get out of whatever daze he had worked himself into, and then his eyes widen and he says “oh, fuck, the kids!” and starts crawling out of under the table. Victor pushes his chair all the way back to give him space.

“Everything alright?”

“Yes! No. I… might have lost my friend’s kids,” he says, looking around frantically before starting to walk away.

Victor falters for a second before he follows. He wonders for a moment if this is how Makkachin feels when Victor walks away before Makkachin isn’t ready to stop being paid attention to.

“Do you need help?” Victor asks.

“I wouldn’t want to trouble you,” Yuuri says, studiously not looking at him.

“It’s no trouble at all,” he says, because he doesn’t very much like how Yuuri went from staring into his soul to not paying attention to him at all. “What do they look like?”

Yuuri bites his lip,  _ still _ not looking at Victor, and then, faster than Victor would expect him to move, darts to one side of the ballroom and grabs a little girl who had been dashing by, swooping her up in his arms and speaking to her in Japanese in an unmistakable scolding tone.

He slowly walks back to Victor trying not to drop the struggling kid who’s giggling and trying to get away. She’s very cute, chubby with a little bun on top of her head in a blue little dress with a big bow at the back.

Yuuri says something to her when they’re close enough and she stops, face turning towards Victor and eyes going wide. She says something to Yuuri and he frowns a little.

“Um, if- if you wouldn’t mind helping,” Yuuri says in English, and trying to avoid looking Victor directly in the eye.

“This is Lutz. They’re triplets so the other two look like her.”

“Triplets? Wow. How do you tell them apart?”

“They come in different colors,” Yuuri says and Victor snorts.

Lutz stretches her arms out towards him and makes grabby hands. Victor immediately melts.

Yuuri doesn’t look very impressed frowning down at her and saying something in Japanese.

“I don’t mind holding her,” Victor says, a little too fast.

Here’s the truth: Victor loves kids almost as much as he loves puppies. There’s something about hanging around tiny human beings who don’t really understand who he is and just think the colour of his hair is cool or that his jumps are cool that is very heartwarming. He can be himself around kids in a way he really can’t around adults who are always waiting for him to slip the slightest bit.

Here’s another truth: Victor grew up a single child in a house full of love with two mothers who would move oceans for him, and when he was very little he always thought he would do the same for his own kids, when the time came. But he’s getting old, and tired, and he feels like he’s missing his chances. It’s more probable than not that kids aren’t something that Victor gets to have.

“Okay,” Yuuri says carefully, and hands Lutz over. “Careful, she’s a con artist.”

Lutz smiles at him angelically in a way that makes Victor immediately believe Yuuri’s words, but she looks so sweet and her cheeks are so chubby and honestly Victor will not mind being tricked by a five year old.

“Okay!” he says, cheerfully. “Hi, Lutz. Nice to meet you.”

“Hello!” she says. “You pretty.”

“Thank you! You’re very pretty too.”

Lutz turns a little shy in his arms. Victor wants to coo.

“Her English is good,” he says, turning to Yuuri.

Yuuri is looking at him with soft eyes and looks a little in awe.

“Yeah. Their mother makes sure their English is good,” Yuuri says, catching himself looking and turning away. He starts walking around the banquet room again, looking around for the other two. Victor pouts at his back a little.

Victor follows.

“Are you going to tell us where your sisters are?” he asks Lutz.

“No!” she says, grinning. And for the next thirty minutes does everything she can to hinder their search for her sisters.

It becomes a game that almost every skater in the banquet are privy to, of sorts. Lutz points them in the wrong direction and tries to distract him, while half the skaters are helping them keep an eye out for the girls, and the other half is having fun watching them run around looking for two small toddlers and purposefully points them in the wrong direction.

It’s a little sad to admit that this is the most fun Victor has had in awhile. But he’ll challenge anyone to  follow Yuuri around a ballroom, sometimes even crawl behind Yuuri under some tables – gods  _ bless _ skaters asses, Victor has seen glory up close several times this evening – and watch him know that people are blatantly lying to him but be too polite to call them out.

Sara Crispino is wearing a beautiful long dress tonight because she’s trying to impress Mila, and it is an absolute treat to watch her lie to Yuuri with a smile when everyone next to them can hear the giggling that comes from under her long skirt.

Yuuri narrows her eyes at her and Lutz laughs at him from her place up high on Victor’s shoulders.

“I’ll go out drinking with you after this,” Yuuri says, sounding defeated.

Sara’s eyes widen. “Swear it on your mother,” she says, sounding oddly serious.

“I swear on my mother.”

Sara grins smugly, and lifts the hem of her dress up.

“Sorry kid,” she says, revealing Loop sitting between her legs. “It’s for a good cause.”

Loop tries to scramble away but Yuuri grabs her under the armpits and lifts her off the ground. She kicks her feet and says something. Yuuri turns her towards Victor and she stops.

“Hi!” Victor says. Lutz waves at her sister and says something that Victor can’t catch. Loop stops struggling, and turns to Yuuri, speaking in quick Japanese.

“She’s asking if you’ll take pictures with them,” Yuuri says, frowning a little. “You don’t have t-“

“Sure! Pictures after we find the last one,” Victor tells her.

Yuuri doesn’t finish translating before Loop starts nodding vigorously and reaching over to Victor.

Victor makes sure Lutz won’t fall and then takes Loop off Yuuri, setting her on his hip.

“Okay! Two down, one to go,” he says, looking expectantly at Yuuri who seems almost amused, and has stopped trying to avoid looking at Victor’s face which Victor counts as a major win.

“Right,” Yuuri says. “Let’s go then.”

They find Axel ten minutes later with the help of a tiny Japanese competitor who trembles all over when he speaks to Yuuri and whose voice is just a little too loud in his excitement. She has apparently somehow managed to get herself stuck inside a tall decorative vase and fallen asleep there.

“Thank you for letting us know, Minami-kun,” Yuuri says, and pats him on the shoulder before moving to help Axel out.

Minami makes a noise audible only to dogs and looks on the verge of tears.

“I’m never going to wash this suit,” he whispers, watching Yuuri take off his jacket and roll up his sleeves, before going on the tips of his toes and bending neatly to reach into the vase. “This is the best day of my life.”

Victor can relate.

“That’s all of them,” Yuuri says, sounding relieved.

“What should we-“ Victor starts only to be interrupted by Loop and Lutz yelling “Pictures!” quickly followed by their sister who goes from half-asleep to wide awake in the span of half a second.

And because you can’t really fight three toddlers, they start taking pictures, pulling other skaters in to join if they’re unfortunate enough to walk by them. Victor finds that Yuuri is very good at taking pictures of other people but can’t be trusted to take selfies to save his life. They end up doing a little photoshoot that runs way too long because Victor can’t say no to anything the triplets ask him to do, and he’s having too much fun to really try to stop it.

They have to wait for their mother to come back from “taking a walk” with their father anyway. Might as well keep the girls entertained while they wait.

“You know what he is, right?” Mila says, sidling up to Victor as he watches the kids mob Yuuri, one of them wrapped around his leg and the other two hanging off each of his arms as he holds his phone up and away from them, not seeming even a little bit bothered.

“What?” Victor asks, not taking his eyes off of him.

Mila leans closer and whispers in his ear, “Daddy material.”

Victor promptly chokes on his own spit while Mila laughs at him.

“You’re terrible,” he tells her. “Don’t you have an Italian skater to bother?”

Mila sighs. “Sara’s brother heard that Katsuki is coming to the after-party and is trying to get her to stay in her room like the bitch baby he is. I’m letting her handle that. Besides, making fun of you is more entertaining than watching those two fight.”

“I’m glad I can entertain you,” Victor says, eyes still on Yuuri being used like a jungle gym. He cuts his eyes to Mila for a moment. “I’m curious. Why is Yuuri going out for drinks such a big deal?”

Mila sips her champagne and gives him a completely wicked smirk. “Oh,” she says eyes twinkling in a way that doesn’t bode well for anyone, “haven’t you heard?”

Victor has apparently  _ not _ heard but he gets to experience it two hours later in a club that Yuuri has led them to like a man heading for the guillotine. He had watched Yuuri down two shots of something, not looking at anyone and then nurse a beer for a bit while the rest of them ordered. And then turn to them, eyes bright and excited, saying, “We should dance!”

Victor has not  _ heard _ about how Katsuki Yuuri is an all-consuming tornado when he’s drunk, pulling you in with his excitable smile and hands that seem to have magnets under the fingertips, twirling you around like it’s the easiest thing to do, stealing your breath, and then spitting you back out at five a.m. in an hotel room and leaving you to stare at the ceiling and try to catch your breath.

“We should dance!” Yuuri will say, looking directly at Victor and his very first thought will be  _ anything _ immediately followed by  _ this is dangerous _ .

Katsuki Yuuri is dangerous. He’s an hazard to public health and for the fragile of heart. A trial put on this earth by the gods. Victor is sure of it. Victor is also sure he’s failing it completely.

Victor has  _ not _ heard, and he never expected Yuuri to be this striking, this riveting, and he never expected to feel it first hand, which he will. He  _ will _ , two hours from now on a dance floor and two years from now under a wedding arch.

But first-

First he meets Nishigori Yuuko who looks beautiful and perfectly composed while her husband looks like he got hit by a train, both of them smiling widely.

She finds them sitting on the floor in a corner of the ballroom, Victor sitting very, very still because the girls have fallen asleep after all the excitement and Yuuri is halfway there, head listing to the side and Victor is holding his breath to see if he’ll fall asleep on his shoulder. She screams when she sees them, and grabs her husband’s arm, pulling him down to her level to whisper loudly in his ear. Victor can catch his name and little else.

Yuuri jerks awake at the sound of her voice, looking around widely, staring at Victor for twenty full seconds before rubbing his eyes and staring some more. “Oh, you’re real,” he says, sounding a little confused.

Sitting on the floor holding two sleeping kids is the realest Victor has felt in a while. He opens his mouth to say something, but Yuuko approaches them, all of her projecting the excitement of a fan when they meet Victor for the first time, so he closes his mouth and he smiles. He listens to her introduce herself and her husband and talk excitedly about how she’s a fan, lets her take the girls off his hands even if he feels left bereft when she does it.

“Yuuri! You should’ve told us you knew Victor,” she says.

Yuuri rubs the back of his neck awkwardly, looking chastised. “Ah, sorry, we just met.”

He’s cute when he’s shy.

“Is that so?” Yuuko says, and Victor turns from looking at Yuuri to look at her. She’s staring at him intently, eyes a little narrowed as if she’s trying to figure something out.

“He helped with the girls,” Yuuri says.

“You have three wonderful daughters, you must be really proud,” Victor tells her.

Yuuko beams. “I am! Thank you for looking after them. Both of you.”

Yuuri nods. “It’s no problem.”

“Great! You won’t mind doing it again when you’re over then?”

Yuuri looks panicked and Yuuko laughs at him.

“Don’t worry, don’t worry, I’m joking. Thank you for getting us tickets! It was really fun. Are you coming with us back to the hotel?”

Yuuri shifts in place a little. “I promised Sara I would have drinks with her and some other skaters.

“Oh, have fun! Is Victor going too?”

“Yes!” Victor says because Mila has been teasing him too much and absolutely refused to give him a straightforward answer to any of his questions. “It sounds like fun.”

Yuuko’s smile turns almost manic. “I hope you have a good time! Yuuri don’t forget your jacket, your mother says you keep losing it at functions.”

Yuuri looks down at himself as if he hadn’t noticed his suit jacket is gone and then excuses himself quickly to go get it. Victor almost follows just because that’s what he’s been doing all night.

“Can I ask you for something, Victor?” Yuuko asks, looking at him intently.

Victor smiles his nicest smile. “You can ask,” he says, committing to nothing, People wanting things from him is nothing new.

“Yuuri gets a little out of control when he drinks, please make sure he comes back safely.”

“I can do that,” he says. It sounds easy enough here in the banquet with Yuuri having been sober and a little too shy and awkward around Victor the whole night.

“Thank you. He’ll be in your care. And some advice for you, if I may give it?”

“You may.”

“Don’t let him ignore you in the morning. He’ll try and it’s not because he really wants to, so don’t let him,” she says, which makes absolutely no sense.

“I’ve just met him,” Victor tells her, not really knowing how to answer to that. “I’ll make sure everyone gets back safely.”

“I didn’t mean to imply anything,” Yuuko says and apologizes. “I hope you have fun tonight, Victor.”

“Thank you, have a good night,” he says, a little confused, and watches them go.

Yuuri returns with his jacket and Mila and Sara and a couple other skaters who are tagging along with him.

“Ready?” Mila asks as Sara starts dragging Yuuri towards the exit without actually touching him.

And Victor, who knows absolutely nothing of what is about to happen to him, who can’t foresee Katsuki Yuuri, like a complete fool, says, “Ready.”

But he is  _ not _ . No one is, and it doesn’t really hit him how very much not ready he was until he’s in his own room, still in his rumpled suit staring up at the ceiling, and feeling as if he has just woken up from stasis, as if his life had started without him so long ago and he’s missed most of it. It’s always at ungodly hours in the morning that the need to  _ start _ to  _ do _ to  _ change _ hits you, and Victor is a mere mortal who has been through a whirlwind tonight. Something just under his skin itches with inaction and he has no idea what to do about it.

He wants change with a vehemence and violence that is jarring and immediate, but he doesn’t know how to go about making that happen. He doesn’t know how to  _ start _ .

So he goes to sleep for a couple of hours, and he showers when he wakes up, going through the motions, and then he takes the elevator two floors down and knocks on Yuuri’s door until it opens.

Yuuri appears at the door half-dressed and with his toothbrush still in his mouth, toothpaste running down his chin, eyes wide and mouth dropping open when he sees Victor just standing there.

“Hi,” Victor says, pretending he’s not feeling awkwardly and restless. “Are you doing anything this morning?”

Yuuri stares at him for a long time before he holds a finger up, and disappears inside his room for three solid minutes before he comes back, toothbrush free and looking a little more composed.

“I’m meeting Yuuko and the girls for breakfast downstairs,” he says.

Victor smiles, and pretends he can’t feel his heart deflate in his chest.

Yuuri shifts awkwardly in the doorway, looks at Victor through his eyelashes – he does that a lot which is absolutely lethal. And carefully, uncertainly, he asks, “W-would you like to join us?”

Victor breathes in sharply and feels lighter. He lets his forced smile go a little softer. He says, “Yes.” And  _ that _ is how it starts.

 

**Author's Note:**

> from an outsider prespective victor spent the whole banquet looking down at his lap before making a weird noise and then five minutes later katsuki yuuri crawled from under his table,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, think about that
> 
> [im on the tumblrs here if that smth ur into](http://crossroadswrite.tumblr.com)


End file.
